BANGKOK — Thai actor James Ruangsak expressed shock after learning that the sole survivor of the Air India crash sat in the same seat number he occupied during his own plane crash survival 27 years ago.
James Ruangsak Loychusak posted on social media after seeing news of the lone survivor from among 242 people aboard the Air India flight that crashed in Ahmedabad, Gujarat state, saying “Goosebumps. He sat in the same seat number as me – 11A.”
Ruangsak survived the Thai Airways Airbus A310-300 crash that went down in a rubber plantation in Surat Thani province on Friday, December 11, 1998. The crash killed 101 people and injured 45 others, with James seated in seat 11A.
Beyond expressing his surprise at the coincidence, he also posted messages of condolence for those who died and lost loved ones in the Air India tragedy.
The Air India crash survivor, identified by the Associated Press as British-Indian national Vishwashkumar Ramesh, was thrown from the plane and walked to a nearby ambulance for help. Dr. Dhaval Gameti, who treated Ramesh, told the AP that the survivor was disoriented with multiple injuries but appeared to be out of danger.
Social media users have been commenting on the extraordinary nature of a single person surviving such a crash, calling it unreal, remarkable, divine intervention, and miraculous.
The AP reported that the rarity of sole survivors from major aviation disasters has sparked widespread interest online about how such survivals occur and whether similar cases have happened before.
In recent decades, several other people have been the lone survivors of plane crashes. At least three other people have been “sole survivors” of plane crashes.
George Lamson Jr., then a 17-year-old from Plymouth, Minnesota, was on a Galaxy Airlines flight that crashed in Reno in 1985.
Lamson in a social media post Thursday said the news of a plane crash in India with only one survivor shook him.
“There are no right words for moments like this, but I wanted to acknowledge it,” he said. “These events don’t just make headlines. They leave a lasting echo in the lives of those who’ve lived through something similar.”
Bahia Bakari, then 12, lived through a Yemenia Airways flight that crashed near the Comoro Islands in 2009.
Jim Polehinke was the co-pilot and sole survivor of a 2006 Comair flight that crashed in Lexington, Kentucky.
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